InShantae and the Pirate’s Curse, Shantae travels to a variety of locales in her quest to prevent the scheming of the Pirate Master. One such locale is Spiderweb Island where she meets her mischievous zombie friend, Rottytops, who’s trapped in a web and is about to be eaten by the Empress Spider. Shantae saves her and helps her down, but it appears that Rottytops was bitten and can’t use her legs.
It’s up to our hero to carry Rottytops through the woods and to her brothers in time. This is a level titled Run Run Rottytops - an unsettling yet light-hearted experience that’s perfectly in the spirit of Shocktober.
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The environment for the level is a charmingly 16-bit kind of spooky. A light thunderstorm is taking place in the background as rain falls over the area. The sky is covered in dark clouds, illuminated by a giant green moon. Lightning occasionally strikes, leaving behind a violent black mark on the ground, upon which grass and rocks are made up of various dark shades of blue and purple.
As you make your way through the woods, you have to avoid many monsters and hazards.The monsters are creatively crafted, with plenty of weird and unsettling concepts. You start off with hands that erupt from the dirt and cut through the air as they swipe and grab at you, and one-eyed ceiling monsters that swing their tongue in your path.
As you progress, you’ll run into sneaky gravestones that blend in with others to catch you by surprise. There are also robots that charge forward to try and kiss you (not quite sure how those fit in, honestly) and toothy worms that pop out of the ground to spit smaller worms at you. You deal with all of this while having to platform and avoid spiky columns that shoot from the walls and ceilings.
The sound design also helps bring the monsters to life. You can hear the hands cut through the air as they swipe at you, the saliva leak from the ceiling monsters' tongues as they droop and sway, while the weighty slam of the gravestones positioning themselves (followed by the cute squeaking sounds of their feet).
The monsters are unnerving, and you feel that in the characters as well, more specifically Shantae. While Rottytops looks unbothered by the ordeal, Shantae looks noticeably in a panic. This is exemplified when she stands still, as she’ll impatiently pace in place and look around nervously - a nice detail in this is how her steps are timed to the beat of the background music.
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The music itself, called The Nightmare Woods (Run Run Rottytops), adds to the premise of a thrilling race against time. The instruments are orchestrated to give you a sense of urgency - especially the drums that Shantae paces to. It invokes the Halloween feel that you’d expect from old-school games filled with monsters. On top of that, it’s super catchy!
On a side note, the song is so beloved that it’s been remixed in all manner of weird ways, includingSayMaxWell’sdubstep remix, as well asmeme tracks like RazQ’s.)
The difficulty of this level is something to write home about as well. Shantae usually has a variety of gear at her disposal, such as the Flintlock Pistol and Spike Ball. However, since her hands are literally full with carrying Rottytops home, none of them can be used to fend off the monsters. To make matters worse, you only have one chance to mess up, or you will have to start an entire section of the level over. It’s very different from the rest of the game, giving you a sense of helplessness as your only options are to avoid the monsters or perish.
Run Run Rottytops has a lot of creepiness going for it, but it isn’t perfect. For a level where you’re supposed to get your zombie friend home quickly, you’re forced to stand and wait around a little too much, and the level also lacks a countdown timer, which would’ve contributed to the thrill as well. With that said, the latter is arguably a sensible design choice and subtle clue as to the reality of the situation, as Rottytops' injury was just a prank all along.
Run Run Rottytops is amazing in many ways. It’s a challenging level, with eccentric monsters, a chilling atmosphere, and detailed sound design and animations. It’s not the scariest level in gaming, but there’s a lot that it offers in the way of jovial spookiness.
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